Startups Face Tighter Market for Venture Capital ‘Fuel’

After rising in 2011, U.S. venture capital investment fell 15% last year.

Taken at face value, that’s bad news for startups. But what does it really mean?

The $29.7 billion invested in 2012 was slightly ahead of 2010, according to Dow Jones VentureSource. And the $35.1 billion invested in 2011 was the most since 2001, as the tech boom took its final gasps. Since then, venture investment has stayed in a range of about $20 billion to $35 billion a year.

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